Nine Lives Katniss Everdeen Never Had
by Jewelinsertwittynamehere
Summary: When her nightmares make it impossible to sleep, and Peeta's arms are not an option, Katniss retraces the steps that led them here. What if, what if, what if?
1. Prologue: Returning Home

**Nine Lives Katniss Everdeen Never Had**

**(and one she did)**

By Jewel

.

Disclaimer: The Hunger Games series and its characters were created by Suzanne Collins and are copyrighted to their rightful owners; no copyright infringement is intended.

Rated: T for themes and language in later chapters

Summary:When her nightmares make it impossible to sleep, and Peeta's arms are not an option, Katniss retraces the steps that led them to here. What if, what if, what if?

Set before and during Catching Fire, but contains spoilers for the whole series. Author's notes are at the end.

* * *

_**Do I dare  
Disturb the universe?  
In a minute there is time  
For decisions and revisions which a minute will reverse.**_

- "The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock" by T.S. Eliot

(…)

At the train station Prim's arms are wrapped tightly around her waist and she can feel her sister's tears soaking into the thin material of her summer dress. Her hair is loose and the wind is tugging at it, making her wish it was in a braid. But they're home now; soon enough she'll be out of her Capitol clothes and that's the first step to getting back to normal. Even as the thought occurs to her, she feels flutters of anxiety in her stomach, wondering exactly how she's going to navigate this new life. Then Prim reaches her, and Katniss is overwhelmed with happiness at the sight of her sister.

"I was so scared for you," Prim whispers, wrapping her arms around Katniss.

She squeezes Prim closer, tears caught on the corner of her eyes, mascara keeping it trapped. She thinks for a second about Rue, recalls the little girl's lifeless body and knows that she would volunteer again in a heartbeat to save Prim's life.

Katniss allows Prim out of her arms long enough to hug her mother. It's almost painful to feel how fragile both Everdeens feel in Katniss's embrace, but fierce pride sweeps through her as she recalls they'll never starve again. All of them – even Gale and his family – could live to ripe old age and never burn through the money the Capitol has deposited into accounts for her.

Her cheek is pressed against her sister's blonde head again when she catches Peeta's eyes on her. He's standing a few feet away, his brothers and father keep clapping his back as if to reassure themselves that he's real and not a hologram. He looks away before she does and the knot in her stomach twists at the familiar routine, reminding her that where ever they go from here, it's not going to be as easy as pretending she has no ties to the boy with the bread. She feels the weight of his lost innocence as heavily as she feels the other twenty-two tributes. But he's alive, and she's alive, and surely the Capitol won't hold them to some reckless teenage romance in a few years when they're older, and Peeta has found someone who deserves him.

Outside the station all of District 12 has come out to greet their victors. Men are unloading heavy crates from the train, some of which have already been opened. Her eyes track a bag of hard candy as it passes through the crowd. Kids, town and Seam alike, are smiling at her, with the braver ones waving, and Katniss smiles back at them.

She doesn't let herself think that the future is wide open to her. She knows there are reasons Haymitch soaks himself in alcohol all day. She knows there are obligations she'll have to fulfill in the Capitol for the rest of her life, even if she doesn't know as yet what precisely those duties might be beyond watching kids from her district die year after year. But standing in 12, with her family pressed close, and Gale and his family striding towards her, with the sun shining bright against a clear blue sky, and with a full stomach, Katniss allows herself to revel in the feeling of being a Victor.

(to be continued...)

Author's Notes:

1) This story is based on the simple premise that Katniss and Peeta were always going end up together, one way or the other.

2) Chapters will be structured in two parts: one part set in the present, after Katniss and Peeta have returned home as Victors, and the second part describing an AU/canon divergent timeline of how Katniss and Peeta were always destined to cross paths.

3) Please stay tuned! I have one and a half chapters already written, with ideas for seven other "lives." The first one is what if Katniss's mother had married the baker? And the second is what if Peeta had gone into the first arena with a different partner?


	2. Chapter 1: The Baker's Wife

**CHAPTER ONE**:

She's been back home for almost two weeks and she still hasn't gotten use to the new house. Her new bed isn't as luxurious as the one she used at the Training Center in the Capitol, but it's a lot better than her old, lumpy bed in the Seam that she use to share with Prim. Now her sister has her own room, decorated in soft pinks with a white canopied bed in the center with an equally luxurious mattress.

Katniss lays on her back, staring at the ceiling. She thinks briefly of sleeping in trees, fastened to the branch to keep her from falling off. The recesses of her mind dredge up an old nursery song: _rockaby baby, in a treetop, when the bough breaks, the cradle will fall_. She has a hard time not picturing Rue plunging to her death from atop a weak branch. She groans and throws a forearm across her eyes, like she can hide from her ugly thoughts.

When she opens her eyes again, she focuses on doing an inventory of her new room. She has a vanity now, where she imagines she's supposed to primp and prep herself when her team's not here to do it for her. The huge bathroom connected to her room has another vanity area, and Katniss wonders how many one person needs.

A matching rosewood dresser keeps her new underclothes, and all of her new clothing (Cinna approved and Capitol made), are hanging in a closet the size of the bedroom in their old house. There are shelves near a window, though they're all empty except for a small music box. She knows her mother put it there. Knows she got it from the Hob because Katniss recalls seeing it there previously. But it sat for years, untouched, because people don't have money to waste on such a useless item. She thinks, automatically, of the week worth of food she could have gotten for the same cost.

As she mulls it over, it occurs to her that her mother must have been use to such trinkets when she was a girl. Katniss doesn't know much about her mother's childhood, just the basics. She was the daughter of the people who ran an apothecary, so she grew up in town with the other merchant families. She's blonde like _her_ mother, Katniss knows this from an old photograph that use to hang framed on the wall of the old bedroom. Her mother was an only child, and her grandparents died not too long after her mother ran away with a coal miner.

When she was younger (much younger and she didn't have to worry about feeding the family), Katniss remembers she use to pester her mother for details of her own childhood. Use to wonder what it would be like to live in a big house in town, what it must be like to have her father around all day rather than just the early hours near dawn and late hours after sunset when he was home from the mines. But then her father died and her mother went away, and Katniss did have to worry about feeding the family. And that meant she didn't have time to daydream about the life she could have had.

Restless, she gets out of bed and grabs the music box. There's a key on the bottom and she winds it up before setting it on her window sill. She sits on the floor, her back against the side of the bed and her eyes watching the box. As the soft music drifts out the window she tries to imagine her mother as a little girl.

She imagines her mother looked a lot like Prim does, with creamy skin and large eyes, but her arms and legs aren't stick thin because she knows where her next meal is coming from. Katniss thinks about the wall around her heart that she put up when her mother first gazed back at her with empty, unseeing eyes. Thinks about how different she is because she grew up in the Seam. Thinks about when she thought Peeta wouldn't survive because what do the merchants know about survival? Thinks about little Rue hiding in the trees, and wonders if Prim would have been able to do the same if Katniss hadn't volunteered.

The music box stops, but Katniss hasn't been listening for it for a while. She wonders, _what if her mother had married the baker?_

She imagines her slim, pretty mother married to the jovial baker; she thinks about the beautiful, blond children they would have had, and her imagination fills in Prim, and then Peeta, in the family portrait. Katniss can't picture herself as part of that family. Instead she knows her father would always have been from the Seam, but she can't picture who her mother might have been so she decides her mother must have died in childbirth, and that's the same reason she doesn't have siblings. She was never meant to live with merchants. But she knows she and her father were happy, even though he still worked in the mines and came home covered in ash every night. She learns traps and snares from him, and improves with her bow and arrow until she's able to take down a deer herself.

She tries to think of what she would have been like. Maybe she smiled more. Maybe she talked to more people than Gale and Madge. Maybe when Peeta looks at her in school, she doesn't drop her gaze. She wonders about the Reaping and wonders if her name would have ever been called. The odds had been in her favor, so maybe that stays the same. But the odds weren't in Peeta's favor, and would he have been able to survive? She thinks maybe he would have. He wouldn't have had to ally himself with the Careers because he would only be looking out for himself. Maybe he never fights Cato and doesn't injure his leg – doesn't end up losing half his leg. Maybe he does win, and District 12 does get to enjoy the Victor's spoils for a year. Maybe he meets a nice girls whose parents are also merchants, but she doesn't need to work in her parents' shop anymore and instead lives in Victor's Village with Peeta.

What kind of life would Katniss have if she'd never gone to the Capitol? Would she have eventually married Gale? She knows she won't ever have children, and knows Gale feels the same way. What kind of life would they have had? Gale working in the mines from eighteen years old to when he dies, maybe in a mine collapse? Katniss left a widow, hunting and foraging for food in the woods. Maybe they have an accident and she gets knocked up like all Seam girls seem to one way or the other.

She spins the scenario in countless ways that night, well until the first pink and orange streaks start to peek above the horizon. And every time she comes back to the same conclusion: one way or another her life was never going to have a happy ending.

(ix)

Katniss is born in the winter, when snow is thick on the ground and the entire district seems to be quiet. But it was a rough pregnancy and an even rougher delivery. Her father is holding her and she's swaddled in a faded but soft blanket. Her eyes are closed and her face is screwed up like she's about to start crying. Her father's rocking her gently but his eyes are fixed on his wife. She's so young and there's a lot of blood soaking into the canvas covering the mattress. The midwife is working at a frenzied pace to stop the bleeding; her movements are precise and her voice is soothing. Still, it doesn't help any, and by the next morning Katniss is a mother-less child.

Her father is her world. He's a tall man, with swarthy skin like hers, but it's got a golden kiss to it where most of the other Seam men have a pallor about them from too many hours in the mines. Sundays are his days off and he spends them with Katniss in the woods. He teaches her how to use a bow and arrow, carves her a small one suited for her hands. He teaches her snares and traps, and she learns how to swim in a forgotten lake.

There's an accident in the mines the spring after she turns ten. It takes about two weeks before they can excavate the bodies. By then she's already been taken to the Community Home.

She didn't have a lot of comforts in life before she was sent to the Home, but once she's there she finds it a bleaker existence. She shares a small, drafty room with four other girls around her age. The mattresses are barely more than pallets and the blankets have a lot of patched moth holes, but they're clean, and anyway they're assigned two to a bed so they're mostly able to keep warm during the night. The food isn't as good as what she had when her father was alive, but at least she always has a meal before bed, even if it's a bowl of watery porridge.

At school the gray smock, standard issue for the Home, marks her as a ward of the district. Kids can be cruel, but Katniss is fast and she's a scrappy fighter. It only takes two altercations for the kids to learn to leave her alone. She usually sits at the back of class and rarely speaks unless a teacher asks her a direct question. At recess and lunch she sits by herself, and it makes the other girls from the Home think she's a snob, but she doesn't care.

The year she turns eleven the Home gets a new house matron, one who isn't as quick with the cane as the old matron. She's a large, raw boned woman with muddy brown hair she keeps under a cap. One night Katniss hears the older girls whisper that the matron was in love with the baker but had been jilted. The matron is a harsh woman who makes cutting remarks, but she's a talented baker herself, and she manages to turn the rationed grain into tasty sweet buns as a Sunday treat.

That summer is the year the Capitol demands extra taxes from all the districts, and the gruel at dinner gets even thinner. The Home announces it's going to host an adoption fair, though Katniss wonders who in District 12 can afford to feed another mouth. But some of the merchants actually show up to the event. Katniss figures they're looking for free labor, and her expression the whole afternoon is less than inviting. The other girls are wearing their neatest smocks, and have combed their hair until their heads all shine under the dim light of the formal parlor. Katniss sits next to the girls her age and tries not to fidget, having been given warning that anyone who misbehaves will miss dinner and breakfast.

The tailor brings some scrap fabric and a needle, and some of the girls take turns trying out their best embroidery. The head Peacekeeper is there too, but Katniss doesn't like the way he's looking at some of the older girls, and she has to try extra had not to tap her foot impatiently. The baker and his wife show up last, but they smile at the girls and pass around a plate of cookies they've brought. The wife is a slender woman with hair almost like moonlight, and she's holding the hand of a little girl that could be a miniature copy of herself. They take a minute to talk to each girl, but Katniss already knows they're likely to choose Tammy, who has similar blonde hair and pretty green eyes, even though she's from the Seam as well.

The baker's wife surprises Katniss when she kneels in front of her and says hello. Katniss mumbles back a greeting, but when the Home matron jabs her in the shoulder she tells them her name. The little girl smiles at her side and echoes back, "Catnip!"

Katniss can't help smiling at the little girl. "No, Katniss, like the plant."

The little girl's smile gets wider and Katniss can see she's missing a front tooth. "I'm named after a flower too! I'm Primrose."

"Katniss has been here since last year," the matron says to the baker, but Katniss frowns when she sees that the matron is staring at a point past the baker's head rather than looking at him. "Her father died in a mine explosion."

The baker's wife nods as if she already knows this. The baker's eyes flicker to his wife and Katniss sees some pink has colored his cheeks. He looks at Katniss for a moment, takes in sight of Prim tugging on Katniss's long braid, and then leans over to whisper to his wife.

That night the girls are all wrapped up in loud conversation, hotly debating who might actually be adopted. Katniss doesn't bother to join in.

The next week she's is called into the matron's office. She's shocked speechless when she enters and sees the baker and his wife. The matron doesn't waste any time telling Katniss that she doesn't need to pack anything and may leave now. Katniss can only gape at the adults, their words slowly sinking in.

.

Life with the baker and his wife is like waking up in a fairy tale. Somewhere in her mind Katniss briefly recalls a story about an orphan who's turned loose in the woods and stumbles onto a witch's house made of candy.

Only the baker and his son, Peeta, work in the bakery. Dahlia, his wife, acts as an assistant for her father who runs the town's apothecary, and she's the closest thing to a nurse that the District has. Katniss expects she'll have to care for Primrose, but Prim actually spends a lot of her time at the apothecary, soaking up her grandfather's knowledge.

Katniss shares a room with Prim but she has her own bed and her own thick quilt, though many nights she wakes up to find Prim pressed against her. She falls into a routine before she even realizes it. She walks to school with Peeta and Prim every day. While Peeta doesn't say much to her, Prim latches on like Katniss is her newest toy, but Katniss doesn't mind and soon Prim's hair is always in a long braid like her new sister's.

After school Peeta helps his father in the kitchen, working on breads and pastries and cakes, while Katniss cleans up and stands at the counter to ring people up. Her observant eyes don't miss how the customers look at her sometimes, as if surprised to find a girl from the Seam inside one of the shops. Even in her light blue cotton dress, which fits her well and is always clean and never wrinkled, Katniss knows she looks out of place. When the family gathers for dinner in the evening Katniss always feels a sense of unease settle over her, like she's trespassing. Everyone interacts easily with everyone else, they tell jokes and laugh about their day. Katniss doesn't usually join in except to say her day was good, or she had a test that day or the next.

The baker and his wife are kind to their children, and to Katniss. Though she suspects they eat better than many in the district, the food is still pretty meager on their table. Katniss wonders why they took her in when it's a stretch for all of them to split their meals five ways instead of four, but none of the Mellarks ever seem put out by it.

Most of their meals are made up of almost stale items from the bakery, and sometimes a stew made of squirrel or rabbit. Katniss has seen Mr Mellark at the back door, trading with a tall Seam boy. Sometimes they even have fresh strawberries. They do get eggs almost daily from Prim's little flock of chickens. One day she asks Katniss how many eggs she'd have to trade to get a goat. Katniss smothered a giggle and told her she'd have to let a good number of them hatch into chicks to trade for a goat.

On Sundays she's not expected to help out in the bakery. She tells the Mellarks she's going to visit her friends at the Home, but she goes to the Seam and slips under the fence. She hasn't had the chance to visit since her father died, but she's remembers where his bows and arrows were hidden, and is relieved to see the weather hasn't taken their toll on them in the intervening year. Her first shots go wide, but after some hours of practice she's able to hit the thin trunk of a sapling.

Her third visit to the woods finds success in one of her snares, where a plump squirrel has been trapped. When she shows up that afternoon, her fifth week with the Mellarks, she's shy but proud to show the baker her prize. The baker passes the skinned squirrel to Peeta, then looks back at her and shakes his head. In gentle tones he tells her it's too dangerous for her to go into the woods, and he expects that she won't ever go in again.

The words tangle on her tongue, and her face feels hot with pride, but she tells him she needs to help. "I appreciate you and Mrs Mellark taking me in, and I won't be a burden on you. I can help with more than the register."

The baker tries to make a stern face, but she knows, even after such a short time with him, that he's not good with discipline.

"I could go with her, sometimes," Peeta offers softly. Katniss is surprised and looks at him. He shifts from one foot to the next.

"It's not as dangerous as it seems," she lies, hoping she sounds convincing. "My father showed me how to get out and back without being caught. And I'm a lot faster on my own."

Peeta doesn't say anything else and the baker heaves a sigh but says nothing. That night they have the squirrel in a delicious pie.

She keeps going back to the woods, and one day she finds a hunting partner. Gale, the Seam boy she's seen trading in town before, sneaks up on her, making her miss her intended target. But it's easier to hunt with him, and he teaches her some new snares. She starts to bag enough game on Sundays that she can go to the Hob and trade for things. This is how she gets a goat for Prim's next birthday.

.

The years pass and Katniss finds herself relaxing, thinking maybe she can be part of the Mellark family. She and Peeta are sixteen, having survived four Reapings, when Prim is finally old enough for her name to be added. Her little sister is terrified the days before her first Reaping, and Katniss is the one she cries for when she wakes up from her nightmares.

Like she has for all of Katniss's Reapings, the baker's wife braids Katniss's hair into an elaborate crown. Before Katniss and Prim are led off to where the girls queue up, the baker's wife hugs them both to her, whispering how beautiful her daughters look.

Katniss and Prim are separated by the officials, and Katniss finds a spot near Madge, the mayor's daughter who eats lunch with her at school. Madge grabs her hand and squeezes it once. Katniss finds herself automatically squeezing back before their hands separate. Her breathing quickens when Effie Trinket steps up. Katniss waits for the wigged woman to say her usual words, _ladies first_.

The magenta clad woman swirls her hand around the bowl before plucking a slip. Her lips are pursed as she reads, "Primrose Mellark!"

Fear, cold and heavy, sink into Katniss's stomach. Prim is shaking her head and backing away from the peacekeepers, but the other girls are moving away in a wide circle, making room for the peacekeepers to reach her. Katniss steps out of line before she even knows what she's about to do. But for the last five years she's lived with the Mellarks and they've been good to her, and she can't stand the thought of going back to the bakery with them while Prim goes to a bloodbath.

"I volunteer!" She says. When no one seems to hear her, she shouts louder, "I volunteer as tribute!"

Katniss's feet are like lead as the peacekeepers lead her up onto the stage. Everything fades into the background, and she feels like she might throw up. She almost misses it when Effie picks a second name and calls out, "Peeta Mellark!"

.

The train ride to the Capitol seems to go as slowly as a turtle. Their mentor, Haymitch, is too deep in his cups to start preparing them. In her hand she's got a tight grip on a gold pin Madge had pressed in her hands. She tries not to think of the baker's wife, and her sad face covered in tears as she holds Katniss and whispers sorry over and over again. She tries not to look at Peeta who seems to still be shell-shocked. His eyes are puffy from crying. Katniss feels too numb to cry.

The week of training and preparation pass in a blur and before she knows it she's on stage in front of Caesar Flickerman and the cameras, exposed to all of Panem. He asks her how she felt when Prim's name was called and Katniss doesn't know what to say.

"If I'm not mistaken, and I rarely am," Caesar flashes a mischievous smile to the audience, "You volunteered to take the place of your district partner's sister."

"She's like a sister to me, too," Katniss says stiffly. She recalls Cinna's words and looks out to the crowd, to see if she can find me. The Capitol thinks she's looking at them, but she's speaking to Cinna when she explains, "Peeta's parents took me in years ago, after my dad died."

"So is Peeta like a brother to you?"

"I guess," Katniss says, shifting uncomfortably. In the last five years she and Peeta haven't really said much to each other. At school he's popular, and usually has several friends hanging around him. At home he keeps mostly to himself in the back of the bakery, or else works on his drawings in his room. Sometimes Prim can get him to join in a ridiculous game or two, but mostly he's a mystery to Katniss.

Caesar's sympathy seems real when he reaches across to pat her hand reassuringly. "I'm sure one of you will make your parents proud."

Backstage she gives a weak smile to Peeta as he walks out to give his interview, but he doesn't look at her.

Peeta and Caesar have the audience roaring in laughter within a minute. He's always so quiet around her that she forgets that he seems to light up in everyone else's presence.

"Is there anyone special waiting for you back home?" Caesar asks, and the crowd goes silent to better hear his answer.

Peeta hesitates for a moment, as if he's not sure of his next line. "There was someone special," he says softly, forcing Caesar to lean in closer. "But the odds weren't in our favor."

Katniss frowns backstage, trying to think who, if anyone, Peeta had been dating back home. She knows she's seen him holding hands with some different girls at school, but he's never brought anyone around to the bakery.

Caesar smiles brightly. "But if you win, Peeta, I'm sure you'll have your pick of the girls."

Peeta's smile looks bittersweet. He's looking at the camera, but it feels like he's staring at her, as if trying to convey something important. Something he wants her to know, but not something he's willing to say. "Well, you see, she came with me."

Even Caesar seems shocked by this. "Are you saying that Katniss is that someone special?" Peeta nods once. "And she didn't know before this?" Peeta shakes his head, like he's reluctant to keep talking about it.

Once Peeta is exiting the stage and the interviews are over, Katniss is the first one to make it to the elevator back to their floor, and she paces while she waits, ready for him when the elevator dings and he steps off with Haymitch and Effie.

Katniss grabs his arm and stops him from brushing past her like she's piece of furniture. "What the hell was that?"

She feels his arm flex under her grasp but he doesn't pull away. Haymitch appears at their side and pushes them apart, inserting himself between them. "This isn't the place, Sweetheart."

Anger dances along her skin like electricity as she shakes Haymitch off of her. She follows Peeta down the hall towards their rooms, but he's faster than she expected and his door closes before she can leap into his room. She spins and almost crashes into Haymitch.

"What's his strategy? How does he think he'll get sponsors with that horseshit?" She demands.

Haymitch rolls his eyes and takes a swig from his flask. His knuckles around it are white, like he's holding on to it to remember that the scene in front of him is real. "That's the boy's strategy to help _you_ win," he says, eyes sweeping over her like maybe she actually has a chance. "Your score with the Gamemakers made sponsors take notice, but now they find you desirable."

Katniss is looking at him as if the sheer will of her loathing of their mentor could make him burst into flames. "You might not care if he lives," she hisses, "but I'm not going to let Peeta throw his life away to save me."

Haymitch laughs and takes another swig from his flask before looking at her with cold, dead eyes. "Your life is over the minute they call your name. The boy wants to go out the way he sees fit. You weren't my first pick, but the boy had some convincing thoughts on the matter."

He turns and staggers down the hall to his own room, dismissing her without any further comment. Her hands are clenched into fists, her nails biting into her palms. She goes to her own room, washes away her makeup and combs out her hair with her fingers before braiding it. She sits on her bed, though she can't bring herself to lay down and pull the sheets over herself. At this point she's counting down hours to the arena, and she'd be best served getting some sleep while she can, but her brain won't turn off.

She doesn't think she really has a chance in the arena, but even if she did, how can she go back to District 12 alone? How can she face the Mellarks? But mostly she wonders how Peeta could have given up so quickly. How he could determine that he wasn't going to make it? How could he decide to throw away his last effort to win sponsors? Katniss owes the Mellarks for more than food and shelter, she owes them for treating her with kindness, owes them for never reminding her that she was from the Seam. Katniss thinks of her sixteenth birthday, last winter.

_She wakes up to find Prim snuggled into her side, something that has become a routine for them. She sits up, careful not to wake up the smaller girl. Outside the window she can see soft flakes coming down. Streaks of dawn should be clinging to the horizon but with all the large, gray clouds she doubts the sun will show its face today. _

_The walk to school is cold even under the warm, fluffy jacket she had received for her fourteenth birthday. Peeta doesn't walk with them that day, which is unusual but happens sometimes. She guesses that as they grew older he probably found it less than appealing to always walk with his baby sister and his... Katniss flounders for a second, because she doesn't know what to describe herself as. She's not his sister, thinks maybe they haven't spent enough time in each other's company to really feel any sibling love or rivalry. Katniss decides that maybe they're cousins. She lets herself think of Prim as a little sister. She's never been comfortable thinking of the baker and his wife as her parents, but guardians sounds cold; she doesn't have any real family anymore, but she thinks this is what it must be like to have a caring aunt and uncle. _

_School is like any other day, Madge sits with her for lunch, and after school she sees Gale waiting for her by the gate. Prim waves at her as she walks with one of her friends, and Katniss remembers Prim is going to her friend's house to work on a class assignment. Gale wishes her happy birthday gives her a hug. He says he has some stuff from his traps this morning and wants to go by the Hob, so she goes with him. _

_She's is late getting home, and she apologizes as she ties on an apron and goes to grab the broom to start sweeping the front room. Mrs Mellark laughs at her and says it's her birthday so she doesn't have to do chores today. Katniss colors a little, because this isn't the first birthday where the baker's wife has said that._

_But before Katniss can protest the baker's wife has taken the broom from her and has untied her apron. She calls for Peeta to come and sweep while she drags Katniss upstairs to their small living room. It's decorated in soft blues, the furniture is well worn but still of good quality. While Katniss sits the baker's wife fusses near the desk where she sits to do the shop's books. She takes a seat besides the puzzled girl and holds out a small white box. Embarrassment always washes over her whenever the Mellarks do something like this. Like when Prim announced to the whole family that Katniss would be the recipient of her first batch of goat cheese. Or when, for Yuletide, Peeta silently handed her a frame that contained a beautiful charcoal drawing of her and Prim sitting together on the living room floor as Katniss teaches her to play a card game. Or all those times when the baker sneaks an extra cheese bun in her lunch._

_The Mellarks are so damn kind that she floods with guilt when she hears Gale make a scathing comment about people from town, about the merchants. And now the baker's wife is looking at her with shiny eyes and barely contained excitement. Katniss is slow opening the box and gasps when she sees the delicate silver necklace inside. The chain feels fragile in her callused hands, and she sees the pendant is a small dandelion. _

_She looks up at the baker's wife. "I can't accept this."_

_Mrs Mellark makes a shushing sound and before Katniss knows it the slender woman has taken the necklace from her hand and darted behind her to work the clasp. "I've had it for years but haven't worn it since-" the baker's wife seems choked for a moment but she covers it with a soft cough. "Well, not since I was a young woman like you."_

_Katniss rubs her thumb against the pendant, feeling the curved lines. "Prim should probably have this."_

_The baker's wife comes to stand before her and runs the back of her fingers against Katniss's cheek. "I have another for Prim, I want you to have this."_

_Katniss swallows past a lump in her throat. "Thank you, it's beautiful."_

_Later, Katniss goes to the room she shares with Prim and stops short when she sees a flickering, thin candle protruding from a cupcake on the narrow table between their beds. Prim is sitting up on her own bed and smiling at Katniss, as if she knows a secret Katniss doesn't. _

_"Make a wish," she urges._

_"Where did you get this?" _

_She's seen them made by special order for customers, but she knows the Mellarks don't usually have the luxury of cake except for the day of the Reaping. When she's closer she can see the delicate petals of a katniss flower piped on in soft, cream colored frosting. The baker makes delicious cakes, but Peeta is the one who makes the beautiful designs that their customers are really after. _

_Katniss doesn't know what to make of this. She figures it's meant to be furtive because it wasn't given to her when she was with the adult Mellarks. Dinner had been the usual fare, a little leaner than most months because they're weathering the worst month of winter while waiting for spring, but after the meal the baker sets a small plate of iced cookies in front of the kids. She wants to ask Peeta why he would do this - how he managed to do it, but she feels silly even as she thinks it. So she tells herself that Prim probably asked him to do it. She doesn't know what to wish for so she just blows out the candle and gently breaks apart the soft cake and hands half to Prim. _

She owes them more than just taking Prim's place. She owes them Peeta, too. So she thinks about what Peeta has confessed to the Capitol. She dismisses it as a ploy, knowing that Peeta couldn't possibly feel that way about her. She's lived with him for five years, if he'd had feelings, surely she'd know? But maybe she can use it to her advantage. Haymitch seems to believe Peeta has won her sponsors tonight. Maybe she can get the Capitol to see that Peeta is the one worth helping. Her high score was due to her brazen attitude in front of the Gamemakers, the Capitol and Careers would realize it soon enough once they were in the arena. But Peeta is strong, and he was good with the sword and spear.

Her thoughts give her a headache, as she tries to wrap her brain around the fact that one, but most likely both of them, will be dead within a few weeks. She looks at the glowing clock and wonders if she'll ever be able to sleep tonight. She thinks about the roof and makes the choice to go up there. She's startled by the blond boy she finds already camped there, sitting with one foot propped on the high ledge, while his other leg dangles anxiously. He looks as surprised to see her and hops off the ledge to stand a few feet from her.

There are at least a hundred things she wants to say to him, that she wants to ask him, but she's finding it as hard to say anything as she did sitting on stage with Caesar. She settles on a neutral statement. "I couldn't sleep either."

Peeta nods but doesn't say anything. She can see the tension in him, as if he's bracing himself for a confrontation. But Katniss still can't find the words to describe all the knots that are twisting in her stomach. She turns and walks over to the ledge, keeping them barely within talking distance. The air in the Capitol feels dirty and polluted, even though everything below is shiny because there's no coal dust covering every building. Unconsciously her fingers find the dandelion pendant and she rubs her thumb over it.

She's aware of Peeta as he takes measured steps to close the distance between them. He leans his forearms against the ledge and looks down. "You father gave her that necklace, you know." He takes her stunned silence as permission to continue. "I'm probably not supposed to know. A few years ago I heard my grandfather mention it. He was saying how glad he was she had come to her senses before she married the coal miner, and hadn't he been right about what a good man my father was."

"I didn't know that," she says with a stammer, not sure how to respond. He's just said more to her in the last minute than she usually hears from him in a week.

Peeta chuckles softly, but she doesn't sense any malice behind it. "I figured you didn't. Around town everyone knows about it. One time, right after you came to live with us, one of Prim's friends told her mom finally got the daughter she always wanted. I didn't know what to tell Prim, she was too young to understand. I think I told her it was because you were prettier."

Katniss doesn't know what to say to him, though she can vaguely remember a period when Prim kept crying because she wanted dark hair and grey eyes too. Katniss doesn't know how she can start processing this. Doesn't know why she asks, "Is that why you hate me?"

She's staring at his profile but his gaze is still locked on the bright lights below them. "Almost wish I did. It would make tomorrow easier."

A tendril of anger spirals through her and she grabs hold of it, wondering how she's lived with them for years and never known this about her father and his mother. She can't help the accusation in her voice when she says, "You never talk to me, then you get on stage and tell me you love me! Now you're telling me your mom was supposed to marry my dad? What kind of game are you playing?" But before he can answer, more words are tumbling out of her. "Haymitch thinks you're trying to save me, spinning some sick story for sponsors. But I didn't volunteer so Prim could watch me kill you! Because that's the only way I'll make it out of there, you know? I have to _kill_ you."

He's quiet for a moment, then says, "I'm not selling the story you think I am."

Her arms are wrapped protectively around her shoulders and she's shivering but she's not sure it's from the cool midnight breeze drifting over them. He slips off his jacket and Katniss notices that he's still fully dressed in his interview attire. He settles his jacket around her shoulders and she's acutely aware of how it swallows her, aware of how large he is even as his scent (not roses but clean, fresh rain) wraps itself around her. When their eyes meet, she's very aware of how blue they are.

"I'll tell you a different story. When I was a kid my mother use to walk me to school. On the first day of school she pointed you out. You were with your dad, and back then you wore two braids. She said she use to know your dad, and when he sang the birds stopped to listen. After I overheard my grandfather a lot of things made more sense. I always catch my dad looking at her, but I never see her looking for him. Maybe she walked me to school just so she could catch a glimpse of your dad."

He pauses, maybe for her reaction. Katniss doesn't have a response for him but she can't bring herself to stop looking at him either. Doesn't know if any of this is true or just a lie he's twisting around her to throw her off. "For about a month after you father died, mom barely spoke. Moved around like a ghost. It scared the hell out of us. Prim's friend is probably right. You're the daughter she would've had."

Katniss wants to tell him that no one would choose her over Prim, but she doesn't think he needs that reminder because Prim actually _is_ his sister. She remembers when they were younger, and sometimes he would read Prim's favorite story to her from a tattered storybook. Katniss would pretend to do homework but she loved listening to all the voices he made up for each character. Her stomach twists itself a new knot as she remembers this.

"I can't let you die in there," he says to her. "It would crush Prim. And mom – well, I've seen how she looks at you, and it would devastate her to lose the last connection to her coal miner."

Frustration drives her to step closer to him. "There is _nothing_ you can say that will make it okay for me to-" She chokes on a sob, and dashes away a stupid tear. "Peeta, I can't go back without you."

He smiles at her. It's not the brilliant smile she's seen before, like when he won the wrestling tournament last year. Or the teasing smile he has on when he's needling Prim. It's so sad that it makes her ache a little. "And I can't go back without you. So where does that leave us?"

Silence stretches out between them, but neither seems ready to leave the roof. They're both leaning against the ledge, looking out at the dark sky when Peeta tries reasoning with her again.

"You're really good with a bow and arrow, Katniss," he tells her in a flat tone, to indicate that he's thought about this and isn't just speaking emotionally. "You have a better chance to make it back home. Me? Well, I can't exactly frost someone to death. I don't stand a chance, and if I'm going to die, well I want to show them that I'm not just a piece in their game. The Capitol would love a fight to the death between siblings. I'd prefer it if they help me keep you alive."

"But why me?"

"You don't understand the effect you can have on people."

Once again she's at a loss for words. She takes a second to commiserate that Haymitch was right, Peeta is very convincing. Now she doubts that she can pull off a romance for the Capitol to sway sponsors for _him_. Although she's seen him every day for the last five years, she feels like this is the first time she's really seen Peeta Mellark. She can't compete with the sincerity she hears in his voice, even as a spiteful voice in the back of her head tells her that he's trying to trick her.

She makes her tone flat to mirror this. "There's going to be 24 of us, and who really knows what's going to happen. If either of us will even survive the first hour. But, Peeta, I'm not going to kill you."

"You might not have a choice," he replies, arching a brow at her. Katniss knows they won't reach an agreement on this. She pulls off his jacket and hands it back to him. He accepts it and folds it over his arm. "This might be a Capitol first. Two tributes who refuse to kill each other."

His laughter that accompanies the statement draws a small smile from her. Recalling his earlier words, she asks, "You said you weren't selling the story I accused you of. What story are you trying to sell?"

He's slow in replying, and Katniss thinks for a moment that he won't answer, but then he turns to face her. "Unlike Prim, I have never once thought of you as my sister."

Her face heats so quickly it's like she's been set on fire again. But before she can respond he pushes away from the ledge and says, "I should probably try to get some sleep."

She can only stare at his back while he retreats back to their floor. She stays on the roof for a little while longer.

.

During the Games, for the first time outside of a Quarter Quell, the Gamemakers announce a special rule: two Victors can be crowned if they're from the same district.

Katniss shouts "Peeta," aloud before covering her mouth with her hand. She finds him hidden in mud, with a large wound in his leg from Cato. They make it to a cave and with a small silver parachute Haymitch lets her know what she needs to do for more gifts.

When Cato is dead and they're both at the Cornucopia, the Gamemakers rescind the offer. Katniss pulls out a handful of berries and holds them out to Peeta.

(/ix)

When Katniss wakes up, the music box is still sitting on the windowsill. She tucks inside one of the rosewood drawers before she heads downstairs for breakfast.

(to be continued…)

Author's Notes:  
1) I know Katniss is born in May, but I wanted her to be born in winter for this. Also, she's still named 'Katniss' because the baker's wife told her coal miner her choices for girls' names before she broke off their elopement.  
2) The AU timeline is its own separate world, and begins and ends in its chapter. I have a habit of starting stories and never finishing them. This is kind of a cheater's way to have a story but not be bound to tell a full story.  
3) I hope you liked it and come back for the next chapter!


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